Sunday 20th July

[03:12 US]

Our UK body clocks mean this isn't such a shock really. But we're awoken at 03:00 and need to get ready for collection from the hotel at 05:10.

Bodies need to be washed, breakfast (some oaty stuff with almonds we grabbed at Walgreens) needs to be eaten, batteries need to be charged, websites updated ;) Should have plenty of time.

Weather snapshot for today says Scattered Thunderstorms, 26'C (79'F) temperature with around 80% humidity.

[23:09 US]

Just after I'd finished updating the previous entry, my laptop decided to install some updates it had downloaded whilst I'd been online. I foolishly let it continue. One reboot later, a dead laptop! It looked to be like one of the main boot files had become corrupted. I couldn't boot into safe mode, nor get the auto-repair to work. Sadly, I'd run out of time as we were fast approaching our pickup for Niagara.

The laptop went into the safe and we headed downstairs to the lobby.

Bang on time, a big black 12 seater van pulled up and we were off!

Being the first to be picked up, we had to wait for another three groups to be collected before we drove out to JFK.

We were given slightly ambiguous instructions and left to it (our driver returned to base) but we did finally manage to get our boarding passes and get on to bluejet flight 102 from JFK to Buffalo. We flew on an airbus A320 (the first time either of us had been on one of these aircraft). One problem immediately arose when we discovered Linda and I were sitting apart - 5 rows apart! Linda wasn't too keen on this at all and I managed to sweet talk the cabin crew into getting us moved together before we took off (sob story about wife nervous to fly etc.etc). Sadly, although we were moved, we ended up 2 rows from the back and were one of the last off the plane! Still, it had more legroom than the 747 we'd travelled to the US in and they were all leather seats too! Two rows of three seats across.

Flying time was 57 minutes and we arrived at 9:03 in a very wet looking Buffalo. thankfully, it was still warm despite the wet floors.

Our guides, Eduardo (from Peru) and Phil (the Italian) drove us over to Niagara and we walked along the un-developed US side, taking photos and video and dodging the sudden showers.

I managed to get some good use from my video camera - the battery life is a little lacking though - I think it'll die before I use up all my minutes on my 8GIG card. Might need to order a backup battery (which no doubt will cost a couple of arms and maybe a leg too).

We then crossed over the boarder into Canada. This side of the falls, is much more developed - it reminded me of a mini Las Vegas in that the place was filled with brand restaurants, casinos and tacky exhibit locations. Still, the view of the falls is far superior from the Canadian side of the border.

More photos/video/showers and we stopped for lunch at the Sheraton Hotel on the Canada side - this had an awesome view of the falls right along it's restaurant area. The all you can eat buffet was part of the excursion cost.

Finally, we headed out to the Maids of the Mist boat trip, complete with long blue plastic ponchos (that made you sweat like a pig) and a camera now covered up for protection with a modified sandwich bag!

This for me was the hi-light of the day. It was truly jaw dropping to be sitting at the bottom of the falls, barely able to see for the mist and completely surrounded with the deafening roar of the falling water. Fortunately, both the camera and the video camera (which made a very brief outing from under my poncho) both survived with little more than water droplets on their lenses!

It was past 4pm by now and we had out return flight at 18:25 so we started to head back to Buffalo airport. The weather was still giving us heavy showers and would also give us just one more kick in the goolies...

Severe thunderstorms between Buffallo and New York had delayed the arrival of both our aircraft and the aircraft that was supposed to arrive a hour before it. Indeed, both aircraft arrived almost on top of each other, both having had to divert around the storms.

Luckily, although we were the second plane out, our aircraft had arrived a few minutes before it's sibling, so our captain managed to secure a take-off slot that was only 30 minutes later than expected, rather than the 90 minute delay we were all expecting.

The flight back to JFK had some interesting light shows outside, but it wasn't particularly bumpy and we arrived back in New York at 20:53.

Last off the returning bus and we finally got back into our room at 10pm.

I set to work getting the PC back up and running (thank goodness for system-restore points!!!) and Linda just, well, fell into bed and is fast asleep as I type. :)

Todays Pictures